Friday, May 22, 2009

In reply to my comments here, I got the following answer from El Ingles:

swede:

you should indeed write more if you are inclined to do so, especially about the US occupation of europe, as you call it. i am sceptical about this thesis, but would be interested in hearing more.

thnks to everyone else as well, for the many interesting comments.

So the discussion continues, and here's my reply:

El Ingles,

Thanks or your interest, and yes I will write about it. But it's not a thesis, it's a fact (as pointed out by Jean-Baptiste earlier in the discussion). There are indeed US troops occupying Germany, Italy and several other European countries.

Gaventa's theory of power shows that power is established in three stages: 1) first by the superior means to apply violence, 2) secondly, once the occupation is a fact, by the building of institutions, and 3) finally by mind control so that the opressee no longer sees himself as oppressed.

The United States always call their occupations liberation. The fact that the oppressees buy into this and are in denial about the fact that we are occupied by US troops shows how completely the US power over Europe is established, it has reached the third step since long ago.

Furthermore, according to Gaventa's three-step approach, each stage rests upon the fundament of the previous stage. It is not possible to build your institutions before you have militarily defeated the country you invade (try to imagine the US building institutions in Germany before 1945). The institutions in turn supports the brainwashing. So all power ultimately rests upon the superior ability to apply violence. So if you want to analyze the power situation, look for who's holding the gun. He's the one calling the shots. Only someone having reached stage-three brainwashing could miss such an obvious fact.

So let's repeat Gaventa's three stages of power. At the first stage the losing side has access to the arena and are struggling there. The arena could be the battlefield or a political arena (this model works equally well to describe the situation of e.g. the Sweden Democrats). At the second stage the losing side tries to enter the arena but is effectively blocked out by the institutions built by the winner. At the third stage the losing side has even lost its awareness of its self-interest and is no longer even trying to enter the arena. They have completely accepted to be oppressed, but actually do no longer see themselves as oppressed. They no longer see it as a conflict; the power of the winner has eaten itself all the way into their brains. This is the moment when the power is total and complete. But also the moment when an inattentive observer will say that there is no conflict of interest in such a place -- only peace, harmony and friendship.

Allegedly the US troops are in Germany as their friends and allies. But you would find that it would be as impossible to put German troops in the US as building a church in Saudi Arabia. What does that tell you?

This power structure has to be fought by unwinding it in the reverse order that it was built. At the third level the brainwashing makes the people consider expression of their self-interest as thought crimes. This hampers people from joining the Sweden Democrats or even to vote for them. At the second level the Sweden Democrats (once people have joined the party in substantial numbers) are blocked out from the medial arena, and thereby effectively blocked out of the political arena. At the first level -- which the Sweden Democrats have not entered yet, but probably will in the next election -- they will continue to lose for quite a long time more. And the brainwashing and the institutional oppression will still be operative until they have won on the political arena, that is until they are in government.

The same applies to the US occupation of Europe. First the people has to be made aware of the fact that we are indeed occupied by US troops (I'm sure I will be able to provide people who doubt about this with documents and pictures that would convince you that there are indeed US troops in Germany, Italy etc.). But we have to get to the first and basic level to break the power, i.e. the US troops have to leave Europe. And the best way to get to this is to break the power-holding institutions, in this case specifically NATO, which is the fundament for all the other power-holding institutions.

Finally, if the US wants to make the point that they are not occupying Germany etc., their best "argument" would be to withdraw their troops. If they use this argument I will admit my defeat in this debate.

29 comments:

thought-provoking stuff. i don't know quite what to make of what you're saying yet, but let me throw a few questions at you.

1) to what extent is what you're saying about ex-enemies of the US (germany, italy) only? it is hard to imagine that any US decision-makers saw the UK as a threat to be neutralized after WWII. after all, we were allies. that is not to suggest that the US might have its own agenda with respect to us, only that that agenda would surely be quite different to its agenda for germany.

2) are there that many US troops in, for example, sweden? i never heard of them. of course, we have US bases in the UK, i grew up near one. but sweden? i found this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_military_bases_in_the_world-1.svg), which is quite interesting. it's as of 2007.

3) i get the three stages of the process you describe: physical occupation, institutional reconstruction, attitude rewiring. but i'm not sure what this is supposed to achieve. to defang germany, fine. to defang japan, fine. but what is the objective in south korea? portugal? turkey? some of these troop presences surely derive from military necessary, real or imaginary. the US military is a vast organization with huge political influence and massive vested interests. i can't see its deployments as mere details in one huge political plan dreamed up in washington. i'm sure you would accept that the deployment in, say turkey, is strategic in nature. but a similar argument could be made for the deployments in germany. indeed, it has been made in recent years (proximity to the middle east, etc.). note that i'm not approving of the US presence there, just thinking about the reasons for it.

4) it looks to me like sweden, switzerland, ireland, finland, france, and austria have no US forces stationed on their soil (as of 2007), but they tread the gamut from PC-crazy to relatively immune (by European standards). equally, italy, germany, the UK, spain, portugal, and belgium have over 1,000 troops, but they too have a wide variety of PC-ness (Brown and Berlusconi?). wouldn't you expect at least a weak correlation between numbers of US forces and PC-ness on the basis of your theory? i can't see it. the italians are about the least-PC people in europe, but that's not what you'd expect from your theory.

5) if the attitude rewiring is complete, why do US forces remain in, for example, germany? surely not to storm out of their bases and impose martial law if the germans move to the right politically? surely they're not going to be patrolling my street if we elect a BNP councillor?

anyway, those are just some initial thoughts. i will think about it some more. i am not dismissing what you say, particularly with respect to germany. but i wonder how much of what we see can actually be explained by the theory you describe if we widen our focus. by the way, how would we explain the americans' own brainless descent into PC multiculti madness, a descent that they will almost certainly never pull out of? if they have forced ours on us through occupation, who is occupying them?

apologies in advance if i have misinterpreted anything you are saying. it is not easy to get a handle on these ideas via just a couple of blog posts.

by the way, an exploration of the likely decline in america's ability to maintain it's empire is important irrespective of how correct or incorrect the theory you espoused earlier is. i look forward to any insights you may have on the subject...

1)... it is hard to imagine that any US decision-makers saw the UK as a threat to be neutralized after WWII. after all, we were allies. that is not to suggest that the US might have its own agenda with respect to us, only that that agenda would surely be quite different to its agenda for germany.

For the war there were the practical alliances, but the peace was ideological. And your country was based on ethnic identity just as Germany. And as you know according to the modern American narrative European nationalism leads to a lot of war and killing, and that includes you too. So you had to be held back too, even though you of course got a better treatment than Germany. But the cultural revolution had pretty much the same effect on you. What happened to your empire? What happened to your colonies? How did that happen? What happened in Suez 1956? Why are there still US troops in your country? Why are you not objecting to that?

2) are there that many US troops in, for example, sweden? i never heard of them.

There were never Nazi-German troops in Sweden. Do you imagine that in case of a Nazi victory of WWII that Sweden would have been excluded from a Nazi cultural revolution?

It's a Wilsonian mistake to think that tiny nations as Sweden are at all truly independent in these times. The modern history of the West is about the Big 5 (Britain, America, France, Germany and Russia) and what they do. What little insects do does not matter. Possibly Italy could have a minor influence though.

Also, one never imposes more power than necessary. Remember that we live in totalitarian times, but there are no Gulags. Simply because no Gulags are needed, the totalitarian rule is firmly in place anyway. One does not apply more means of oppression than needed. Furthermore, if Sweden would suddenly start enacting proper measures such as your Options 1-2, we would have US troops here faster than you can say "Serbia". And that held true also in the times when we actually had a military. You know it, Sweden knows it, the US knows it -- that's why it works, that's why it is sufficient.

3)... but a similar argument could be made for the deployments in germany. indeed...

Do you agree that German territory was occupied in 1945? When did the occupation end?

4) it looks to me like sweden, switzerland, ireland, finland, france, and austria have no US forces stationed on their soil (as of 2007)...

I already answered this under (2). Most of the countries you mention are not part of NATO, but are nevertheless protected by / under the thumb of NATO. Have you ever played Go? You can control a square without actually occupying it. If Sweden, Finland, Ireland or Austria would implement Options 1-2, you will have the "world community" turning against them, and next there will be NATO bombs and/or troops. These lands are indeed controlled by US military. To imagine something else is indeed very delusional.

France is a different case, since France is the historically strongest ideological ally of the US, they are the ones who have pushed the propositional nation, based on "social contract" and not ethnicity, down our throats. It thanks to the protection of the US military that France can run amok in the EU, and decide so many things for the whole continent, with but Germany and Britain surrendering to their will.

wouldn't you expect at least a weak correlation between numbers of US forces and PC-ness on the basis of your theory?

I don't understand that question. Have you at all considered military strategy? That's what it is about, not some simplistic correlation. Consider the game of Go again. Look at the areas you are controlling. That's where you can impose your cultural revolution. If you play Go and think that only the squares you occupy are yours you will soon lose the game.

And the thinkers behind the current world order understood the concept of the Big 5 just as well as I do. That's why the slogan of NATO is "Keep America in, Russia out and Germany down". In addition it grants France the possibility to run amok in the EU. Italy is simply not important enough. Furthermore, Northern Europeans are "whiter" and therefore less is accepted from them. In addition they are Protestants. And there is even more to it, but I cannot go through every single country in Europe and their history and culture to explain it in this answer without writing a long essay. I think you are getting lost in details and miss the bigger picture. The truth is that also for Italy that same holds true: it's not until US troops leave Germany that they can be completely free, that there can be a real change even in Italy. There will be no Option 2 before that.

5) if the attitude rewiring is complete, why do US forces remain in, for example, germany?

Once we have built the roof of a house why can't we remove the foundation? Of course we can't! As I repeatedly say, all power rests ultimately on military power. Look for who's holding the gun! Take away that gun and the whole power order changes. Look at how our totalitarian order is upheld. All three stages are in action, mostly but not necessarily always in that order: 3) ostracism (mind control), 2) throwing people committing hate crimes in jail (institution), 1) violence, e.g. Antifa or the bombing of Serbia.

by the way, how would we explain the americans' own brainless descent into PC multiculti madness.

They invented multiculturalism, it's in their nature. American's are traditionally egalitarians (quite as Swedes). That's why this is what they are imposing in their cultural revolution. I have written many times of the historical background for this, which shaped Americans in this way. But right now I'm writing a comment reply and not a whole book.

apologies in advance if i have misinterpreted anything you are saying.

I would say you misinterpreted a couple of things, and even missed the overall point. But no need to apologize for this, this is what dialog is for! So to the contrary, you should be commended for your willingness for dialog.

it is not easy to get a handle on these ideas via just a couple of blog posts.

Yes that's very true. Every time I write it's just a narrow projection of my ideas. I'm very much aware of that. Give me until the end of the summer to provide the full picture.

an exploration of the likely decline in america's ability to maintain it's empire is important irrespective of how correct or incorrect the theory you espoused earlier is.

Yes, the two things can probably be discussed separately.

However, how come you refer to the US as an empire and still do not see their military presence in Europe as an occupation?

P.S. Also, while post-1789 France was somewhat ... well, you are right in what France concerns, France has always been the anti-National state.

But America? Only in 1965 or so did America started to fall into a multicultural calderón. Before that, its criteria for ethnicty was different from Europe, but it existed. It had not that much to due with race because some Europeans were considered of a better kind than others (Nordic, Protestant, Anglo-Saxons, Enlightened Liberals).

America was a whole new experiment; France was just a Le État c'est moi thing since the beggining: Hunting down all the others who did not spoke the bastadised Latin of the Germanic invaders who sattled in Paris and directing Cruzades against heretic Christians and raiding everyone who rivaled with the state, as the Knight Templairs.

The United Stats is the multicultural cauldron. And you should change 1965 to 1865. Read my post Anthropologist out in the fields. If you corrupt and transform a core social concept, the society will start disintegrating from within. In 1865 the US took two huge steps simultaneously: the black slaves were freed, but at the same time they were made citizens! To make such culturally and racially different people citizens, as a group, who forever held a grudge against the original American nation, undermined the whole concept of American citizenship, and meant the birth of multiculturalism. The ancient city-states, or the Italian city-states of the Renaissance, understood exactly the importance of citizenship and how it held the society together. For the United States (the winning side) it was just a tool in their social experimenting, their enlightenment project, and expression of their egalitarian mentality. Quite as it is with gay marriage today.

People today, sitting in the Platonic cave being fed with enlightenment ideas, do not see this. The are conditioned to be blind about the significance of citizenship (quite as they are blind about how Europe is occupied by the US, even though the troops are just in front of their eyes). It's only seen as a human rights issue. But of course, if anyone has the "divine" right to be citizen anywhere, the concept of citizenship is dead. People today have a good idea of how a car is constructed, but have lost the idea of how a society is constructed and kept together.

There is more to it, to show that the US is the source of multiculturalism. I have written about it before, but I'll make a new post about it.

This is a brilliant analysis by you and Jean-Baptiste. Of course, everyone in Europe knows this but it will take some time for this to sink in among our American allies. They have to realize that the problem with Europe is not mutliculturalism, liberalism, or PC; those are all symptoms of the American program. The problem with Europe is that America is trying to replicate itself in Europe in order to solidify its economic, military, and geopolitical position. When I say "Europe", I am not including Britain which is an Anglo nation which by definition is a supplicant ally and no threat at all. However, even Britain, America's greatest European ally, is still subject to the Americanist treatment. For cultural and quasi-racial reasons, Anglo nations are not a threat to each other even if they disagree on certain policy points. The way America treats Germany today should also tell you how much she fears her especially if you compare her situation to that of Japan's. America is willing to go to bat for Japan and protect her under its nuclear umbrella whereas it is willing to do nothing on Germany's behalf.

The institutions that re-enforce the Americanist propaganda is a very important point. This is the source of the anti-nationalist sentiment among the European elites. The Euro elites are transnationals themselves that work in tandem with their American counterparts in industry and Washington. The Americanist program benefits them as well so they will never oppose it and the cultural aspect of Americanism fits nicely with their leftist ideology.

Also, we know what happens to countries that oppose the Americanist program. Serbia is a great example of what will happen when they dare to cross America. They had made it clear in several wars that they wanted an ethnostate and to retake Serbian land that was divided up arbitrarily by Tito. And what did America think of this?

"Let's not forget what the origin of the problem is. There is no place in modern Europe for ethnically pure states. That's a 19th century idea and we are trying to transition into the 21st century, and we are going to do it with multi-ethnic states."- General Wesley Clark

There is a double standard of course with respect to Albania and Kosovo but that is only because they are discriminating against Serbs (the new Nazis). If they were treating another ethnic group the same way they treated Serbs such as Turks or Nigerians, America would also come down hard on them as well. The only way for a European country to survive as an ethnostate is to be poor so that America doesn't notice and to not advertise its lack of diversity.

There was a post on a blog recently set up by an LGF commenter replying to criticism against Charles Johnson - I forget what it's called - wherein several commenters (mostly if not all American) defended European nationalist parties against various smears.

The blogger's response was that he couldn't see how the various European polticial parties being defended were Constitutionalist in an American sense and thus deserving of any trust.

It seems to me that when the various electorates of European countries came under American influence in 1945 they were presented with two political options - American liberalism and American conservatism.

It would have been (and still is) impossible for Europeans to adopt a specifically American conservative view so naturally they went with American liberalism, which is abstract enough to be incorporated as an ideological import.

The inevitable failure of Europeans to adopt American conservatism is resented by American conservatives and in retaliation they deride Europe as the source, the Mordor, of (American) liberalism.

Very interesting comment and completely in line with my way of thinking. Your paragraphs 3-5 are excellent.

It would have been (and still is) impossible for Europeans to adopt a specifically American conservative view so naturally they went with American liberalism, which is abstract enough to be incorporated as an ideological import.A parallel to this is how the American Age made Europeans leave Christianity. The Americans see European Christianity under the state church as theocratic and therefore illegitimate (historically the state church was of course exactly an agent in opposition to theocracy, which reversed the church power and put it under the state). So European Christianity wasn't acceptable. And it was impossible for Europeans to adapt American style Christianity. So the Europeans turned into secular liberals, which among the options that was at all possible for the Europeans was the only one acceptable to America.

And European traditional conservatism is seen as the greatest evil by America. Worse than Communism, and equated with Nazism.

And the Americans are left completely surprised by the result of their own actions: How on earth did it happen that the Europeans left Christianity???

Quite as the unintended consequences by the zeal of the Protestants who hundreds of years ago banned Saint Nikolaus in December up here. The result of this was the reintroduction of a neo-pagan figure the Yule Gnome (jultomten/julnissen) for this purpose. How on earth did that happen??? The Protestants will never figure that one out.

Occupation of a country, to me, involves rather complete control down every important avenue of existence.

The US German force, now about 87,000 strong, is mostly in garrison, and is designed to be a tripwire in the event of a (now defunct) Soviet Russian assault.I do find characterizing this as an occupation to be, well, rediculous. The definition of occupation does not hold here. Last I knew, the German population was in the 80 millions.

What is most clear is that the US has underwritten and underpinned the defense of Europe since 1945, which has allowed the nations there to barely average 2% or 3% of GDP for defense spending.

I would welcome the withdrawal of US troops from Europe, along with a significant savings to our treasury. Europe, however, would be left as a ripe plumb for the picking for any nation that had aggressive tendancies, say, in 2020,since their standing armed forces are woefully weak and are probably destined to remain so.

Why do you associate the occupation of a country with totalitarian control?

The British historian Andrew Roberts has said that at one time it only required a few thousand British soldiers to maintain order over the entire Indian Subcontinent.

The British delegated the administration of large parts of India to individual rulers of (nominally sovereign) Princely states.

During the 1800s there were usually no more than 1,500 British troops of various Regiments of Foot (and up to two troops of horse) stationed at the Royal Barracks in Ireland.

Ancient Athens used to extract an annual tribute from the other Greek city-states as payment for its naval protection after the victory at Salamis.

So America could be said to be benign and generous by comparison. But ask yourself what was the stipulation for taking the Marshall Plan money? Joining a Common Market.

Google 'Euro-federalists financed by US spy chiefs - Telegraph'.

Declassified American government documents from the fifties and sixties show that the US intelligence community funded and directed the movment to turn Europe into a centralised superstate.

Why the CIA, instead of say the KGB, has such an interest in this is still not entirely clear to me.

In any case the Cold War is over and NATO, lacking any fixed purpose, has been transformed into an extra-territorial invasion force for Muslims. In my opinion it ought to be dissolved, or reduced to three members - America, Turkey and Albania.

There is the question of the intermediary stage between the departure of American troops and the forming of new armed forces. It would have been oportune to dissolve NATO at the close of the Cold War when Russia, Iran and Iraq were all weakened from a decade of fighting. I have no solution to this problem.

I don't worry that Germany would ultimately be unable to form a new armed forces if they had to. It would require the revival of the Prussian military tradition which should be doable. The reason their current standing army is so poor is because the job of protecting Germany has been literally outsourced to the US.

Incidentially in the event of a break-up what would happen to the 87,000 American troops suddenly out of a job? I imagine they would be retained and put to some other purpose - perhaps nation-building in Somalia or Yemen. This is what the writer Justin Raimondo calls military socialism.

Let's start with what we agree about. When you say "What is most clear is that the US has underwritten and underpinned the defense of Europe since 1945" and "Europe, however, would be left as a ripe plumb for the picking for any nation that had aggressive tendencies" it speaks loud and clear: the EU countries are under US military control, the EU countries do not militarily control their own land. And this is very important. The one in military control decides the frames of what's allowed and not.

You object to the word occupation. However, I'm stating it as a mere fact. I've been doing so since 2003. And back then I was positive about it. My way of arguing was that our liberty is ultimately defended by military force, and that force comes from the US. For this I was described as fanatically pro-American by other Swedes. I still stick to that argument; this is the power configuration we live under. But since then I have found that it is an apple with a worm in it; that is eating us from the inside. And that certainly makes the whole scheme less attractive.

So I'm not using the word occupation in a negative sense. Just as a way of stating the fact of the situation, once rhetorical cosmetics has been peeled off. I'm curious about what you would call it: protection by friends who expect us to keep our own ability to defence down? That's sounds like the sort of friendliness of the mafia to me.

And I'll put forward the same questions to you that I asked El Ingles: Do you agree that German territory was occupied in 1945? When did the occupation end?

The US German force, now about 87,000 strong, is mostly in garrison, and is designed to be a tripwire in the event of a (now defunct) Soviet Russian assault.

The US German force and the whole raison d'être of NATO is to keep Germany down, Russia out and America in. It's been stated so openly since the very beginning. Surely, during the Cold War it was possible to pretend that it was only about keeping the Soviets out. But that fact that the US troops still remain there, proves this idea to be wrong, and that the objective of NATO is the very same since its inception: to keep Germany down, Russia out and America in. And that's exactly what it's doing. And in addition it's keeping the Muslim interests above the European. Islam O'Phobe made a good point about that.

A final question which is more for the Europeans here. Nevermind the word occupation, do you feel a pleasant yummy feeling in your tummy about how the US is in total military control of the European continent? Do you think the Serbs feel the same way after having met the true face of the US military control of Europe? First they came for the Serbs, then they'll come for the Dutch(?), and you are still not paying attention??

What is the whole point behind the second amendment? Apparently Americans who support this order of US military control of the European continent do not believe in the essence of their own principles. Apparently a European country has less rights than any American individual. These Americans believe that it's their natural right to have their second amendment but that Europeans should be stripped of all such rights and be left to the tyranny of the US FedGov. Europeans are seen as morally inferior to Americans (and Muslims), and the US troops are kept around here to hold down evil European nationalism, being prepared to jump in and give the Serbian treatment in any European country that declares itself free from this yoke and the Muslim mass immigration that it entails.

There are conspiracy theorists practically everywhere, and here I have found a good one! There are so many little twists to set straight that I balk at the attempt, especially since I know that my arguments will fall on deaf ears.I think I will list my challenges:1. The US is not in any way interfering with German autonomy or sovereignty.2. US forces are not deployed in any sort of threatening way to Germany.3. Germany has 240,000 troops or so, separately commanded by Germans. That is 3 times the US contingent.4. They have their own development of weapons, and they do a great job of it.5. Britain had 75,000 troops in India in 1880, plus they were augmented by sepoys and the newly developed Maxim machinegun, which tilted the odds to them decisively.6. There is no comparable suituation in Germany, plus there is no penetration of the German government at any level, as the Brits had everywhere in India: the ubiquitus civil service, that made things work, and reduced the need for troops.7. Reparations are over. There is no tribute to the US now.8. I would challenge your idea that the US was instrumental in forming the EU. The European nations were at fault there. 9. You have no idea what the US Constitution and Amendments are all about! The 2nd amendment, in effect in 1791 as part of the Bill of Rights, recognized the right of the people to bear arms. And we do still! There are about 60 million gun owners in the US, and they own about 220 million guns. Every American has the image of the Minutemen in the Revolutionary War in his heart: to preserve and defend the US, as well as to defend themselves. There is and has been no damn concern at all for Europeans being denied arms involved since 1791! That is strictly an European thing. I could go on, but I am very sorry that you have such off-the-wall ideas about the US. I worked around NATO and in Germany, Holland and France for 13 years, was privy to many things, and none of what you are touting was evident, and it would have been.

The trouble is, NATO is a shell of its former self, and is no longer an effective fighting force. Its main mission is over, and the nations are collecting their peace dividend from that by scaling their militaries back.

The US has drawn down from a peak of about 350,000 men to the 87,000 I mentioned before.

There is no control exercised by the US over the EU, or the nations under it. They are all sovereign nations. We do have mutual defense treaties with most, sure.But there is no control over national decisions.

I will move on now. I cannot spend the time needed to rebut each and every one of your concoctions, half-truths, and speculations. But you do rate high on my conspiracy theorist list!

"5. Britain had 75,000 troops in India in 1880, plus they were augmented by sepoys and the newly developed Maxim machinegun, which tilted the odds to them decisively."

I said at one time. I did not mean after the Mutiny in 1857. Anyway my point was only that not all territories were under the control of the Raj and that the word occupation does not necessarily imply totalitarian control over every aspect of national existence.

"8. I would challenge your idea that the US was instrumental in forming the EU."

Okay, so challenge it. Did you read the article in the Daily Telegraph about the declassified OSS and CIA documents? These documents are primary sources that were found by Joshua Paul, a researcher at Georgetown University in Washington. They include files released by the US National Archives.

I'm not advancing a theory, I'm alerting you to a news story in one of the world's major broadsheet newspapers about historical documents that have been made public and clearly show that the U.S. was instrumental in forming, funding and directing the European Project from 1948 onwards.

sorry for being so late but I've had too much to do.The thing is, off course America is "the multicultural cauldron" when seen from an ethnocentric European prespective.

My basic argument is that the United States is in a different category from the European Countries. Yes, it is an Anglo country - or so it should - or WASP, or North-Western European or white or whatever. It's not Charokee like Sweden is Swedish or the Basque country is Basque. Nor has it suffered from the same process of "ethnogenisis" as the big states in Europe have, like Germany, Italy or even "Brittain" or England.

But France, in my prespective stands out in Europe as a "Statist Nation" since the very beggining. And this idea became radicalised since 1789. I mean, Lille is Germanic but Nice is Latin...how can a country with so many different traditions be an organic Nation?

France aside, the United States purpose was to built Europe in America and they were rather successfull. It's the truth that since 1865 they freed the slaves, but it is also true that for a century, African-Americans were a not-that-destructive minority and its importance in the society declined up untill the 50s. America was a clearly European Nation up untill 1965.

I think that we should differ Citizenship from Nationality. You know... the Romans. They gave Citizenship for everybody in the empire (and that's partially what ended them) but "Romanity" was what united the elites, the Roman spirit, throughout the empire. Let's call it Nationality. It's like, when you have National pride, it will be the first and lowest form of Aristocracy...

My point is, the African-Americans were, in the period 1865-1965 recognised and treated as Human Beings with Human rights by and under the U.S. state-Nation. This is Citizenship. However, they were not "de facto" Nationals of America. That was an European, prefirably WASPish exclusive.

So, in the end, they were tolerated but were not seen as equal. Then, from 1965 the multiculturalist madness took place by rising everyone to National.Or offering citizenship to every one who crossed the border instead of only to those who have already been the Nation's slaves.

Don't take this to personally: I think you're right that we should review our Civilisation's destiny and what has gone wrong. And I'm sure it goes back to the enlightment/1789.But we also have to see the causes and what could/should have been done in the face of those adversities.

Of course the French Monarchy did not behave well before 1789.You criticise the egalitarism of the liberation of African-Americans, but, unless you defend slavery, they did what they should, right? They even tryed to ship them back to Africa...

I really think the roots go back to the enlightment, but, in this case, the "evil" was done in the XX century, during the Cold War. Wish was caused by Communism/failed Nationalism which in turn was caused by the French Revolution.

My little country, in decadence since it was annexed by Spain in the XVI century and in great decadence since the mid XVIII century earhquake that destroyed one of the biggest European centers at the time has it all clearly well defined. To my eyes now, it's a struggle between good and evil.

But this is mainly because it is a small Nation subject to external influences. What do you learn? It's all been external influeces.

* That's why I think our Civilisational future lies upon the defeat of the Eurasianist view in Russia (Yeah, let's unite Slavs, Turks and Mongols and rule the world!) and make it penetrate Europe: Belarus, Ukraine, the Baltic States... And make the people of Belarus and Ukraine just Russian rednecks who speak funny. With time, they will be the first Russians to recieve some Western influence and influence Moscow itself.This is not only invite Russia in as it is also to Europeanise Russia as well.If Russia absorbs Ukraine and Belarus it *will* become more European and can continue with its "fascist!!!!" policies that have made Russia a fascinating topic.

Not only this, Brittain is too important as well. The people there are too tired, too sophisticated and to proud to be erased by their colonial subjects and third worlders in general. Actually, Brittain/England has had a steady history of anti-Socialism and anti-Statism.

More than Germany up, I think we need Russia in and England up. When the sub 30 years old in America are majority not white, how will the country sustain itself?Obama has made too much to revive the State's pride on their states. Maybe, after all, Obama does a good thing.

are you kidding or what? The Soviet Union recognized its former satellite countries, members of the Warsaw Pact as free and sovereign nations since the early 50s. What's your point? Do you really believe they were sovereign and independent? Supposedly, these nations took full control of their lands in the same time too. The Warsaw Pact and NATO were formed at the same time, as rival mirror images.

But ironically enough, the Soviet Union collapsed and the Warsaw Pact was officially dismantled as an anachronism; it's only NATO that survived as a vestige of the Cold War. And as a double irony, NATO is expanding, too blind too see that Russia is not the Soviet Union anymore (or Serbia is not Yugoslavia).

So, who do you think act as an anachronism on the international stage now? Russia or the USA?

Sorry, in Mannning's post I didn't see "UN membership" and "1973", I was thinking about NATO. It's very possible that the USA officially recognized West Germany as a sovereign nation in 1973, but this is just a technicality. Because West Germany had been a NATO member since 1955, and had American troops on its soil since the end of WWII. It doesn't make much difference, it only makes the things more interesting: because if you don't recognize a nation as sovereign but you still have troops in that country, this is the very definition of what we call "military occupation".

Both the US and the Soviet Union were not simply military occupiers; they also exported an ideology, it was also a matter of cultural hegemony. It was precisely this ideology, in Western Europe, which led to the formation of the European Union.The fact that America has recently decided to withdraw some of its troops from Western Europe is not related to the acceptance of European sovereignity, but a recognition that the process of "Americanizing" Western European institutions is almost complete. The next step is to expand NATO and thus to surround and threaten Russia.

Well, now, that is an erroneous definition of "occupation". If that is the case, then the US has been "occupied" by the Germans for 60 years. We have had thousands of German officers and airmen stationed in Texas for years and years, training for flying and maintaining their aircraft. Holland is "occupied" by hundreds of foreign national troops stationed there for years to be trained to use naval electronics.Britain os "occupied" by thousands of US troops. Of course, these were all cooperative ventures by NATO Allies, including the troops on German soil, but that little detail you ignored.

I still say that it is the fault of the nation concerned and its citizens if a foreign culture becomes accepted and adopted. Every nation propagates its own culture, but only the receivers can accept it. If you own culture was so weak that it could be overridden by US pop culture, woe unto you!

There is little that resembles American values in the socialist governments or the leaders of Europe. So long as this is true, you have nothing to worry about!

Afonso, current events form future trends. For example, I think that the current liberal worldview will collapse because the current events show that it will happen in the future. In the same way, it's reasonable to say that freeing the slaves in the 19th century lead to the 1960s multicultural idea(with some European Marxist help, but it would have got there nonetheless). I won't go into it, but the same thing happened with feminism and women. There are a few things that people don't get, which really hampers their ability to understand policy:1)logical fallacies2)the exponential function3)that current events form future trends. And for the US, the solution was freeing the black slaves on the condition they leave the country. Funny enough, my country did the same thing about gypsies - we freed them and made them citizens on our own land and now they are displacing us on our own territory. Anyway, at least we didn't go through the 1960s insanity so we can still see it as a problem.

El, if the US were such great allies, why didn't they help with the Suez canal, but de facto pushed all European powers to decolonize? As CS pointed out, the peace was ideological - Europe lost, America won. Well, actually, Europe lost in WW1 because neither side in WW2 was a proper reflection of what Europe was about.

You and CS are right about the nature of America's relationship to Europe, at least for the first 40 or 50 years after the war, but right now, if any European country formally requested American troops to leave, they would. Why don't they? CS's brainwashing theory may be part of the reason, but he also notes that since the Europeans have internalized multiculturalism now and do it even better than the Americans, they now dislike the Americans for being too "right wing" (LOL) so why don't they just tell us to go? We would be very happy to at this point. In fact, I predict that we will do it ourselves starting within the next 2 or 3 years because of fiscal necessity.